ST Analysis of The Force Awakens (Themes, Symbolism, etc.)

I'm starting this thread for a serious discussion of TFA: themes, symbolism, etc. Accept as a given that it's well-acted, well-written, has depth, etc. for the purposes of this thread--if you want to debate that stuff, there are other threads for that.

So, here's something to kick things off: I'm struck by the use of the freighter as Campbell's "Belly of the Whale". Rey and Finn at that point shed their old identities but have yet to accept their new ones--it's an initial death and resurrection. Although Maz's castle plays the "cantina" role in many ways, functionally, it's the rathtars sequence that serves this role in TFA: both are a kind of nexus or threshold between the ordinary world and the larger galaxy, both have the male hero being threatened with death and both introduce Han.

Thoughts? On this or anything else?

 

Here's a short review and analysis I posted elsewhere. Wrote it up rather quickly, and would normally have spent the better part of an hour editing it, but...I need sleep.

Letting Go of the Past, But Not Forgetting It
Review and Analysis of Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Like each of its major characters, Star Wars: The Force Awakens (TFA), as a film, deliberately and tenaciously hangs onto the past. It struggles to move forward and to chart new territory – away from the deserts, forests and snowy landscapes of its past, and into a wondrous future. But finally, as it stands on the windswept cliffs of Skellig Michael, it does let go. But not without holding onto the best lessons from its past – the themes, the characters, the spirit and the story that made its predecessors so compelling. It’s this theme of letting go of the past, but not forgetting it, that characterizes this film and its story best. Both the story that takes place in a galaxy far far away, and the story of the film within the context of popular culture here on Earth. And it’s this coherence between its in-universe story, and its out-of-universe story, that makes it a great film – right up there with the best in the saga. It is both internally coherent, and meta. It lets go of the past, but doesn’t forget it. And its characters, for the most part, do the same thing.

More importantly, TFA is both timeless and timely. As with previous Star Wars films, it addresses the age-old “hero’s journey.” But it is also very conscious of the current zeitgeist, and the human condition as it exists today. For example, the film's major theme of letting go of the past, but tapping into its wisdom, is consistent with what the film is as a "thing" in popular culture. In essence, it's not just a Star Wars film. It also says something about our current culture - both the mainstream kind (the remix culture that’s concerned with spinning old ideas into new forms) and the subculture of "fandom" (e.g. the commentary on “fandom” characterized by Kylo Ren’s character).

And so, because TFA speaks to the human condition in both a timeless and timely way (as did ANH in 1977), it could be destined to be a classic.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Here's my far too long review and analysis of TFA. It's a bit flabby, so bear with me. I would have edited it a bit, but in a lot of ways, the ramblings below reflect my frenetic excitement about being in love with a Star Wars film again.

The Plot: The Jedi of the Past are the Key to the Future

I want to get one thing out of the way, as there seems to be some confusion about it. What’s the Force Awakens about? There are two main answers to this question – one related to plot, and the other to theme.

The film’s plot is about the search for the legendary Luke Skywalker. The revival or destruction of the Jedi are the primary stakes. That’s clear from the opening crawl, and from the main thrust of the objectives of both the good guys and the bad guys. And that’s why the film promptly ends once Luke is found. In essence, the movie is one big race, and the runners are the protagonists and the antagonists. The Starkiller threat, the Resistance counter-attack, and all that other stuff, are merely obstacles in that race. Sideshows in the quest to find Luke, as evidenced by the fact that the final First Order-Resistance confrontation really doesn’t get all that much attention (and isn’t introduced until half way into the film)! If the assault on the Starkiller Base feels perfunctory compared to the Almighty Trench Run in A New Hope, that’s because it is supposed to be. The story here is about Rey, Kylo and Finn’s personal journeys, and about finding Luke, not blowing up superweapons.

This is also a personal story more than it is a galactic one, though that personal story has galactic consequences. As General Hux says to Kylo Ren when disputing his obsession with finding the map to Luke Skywalker: “Careful, Ren. That your personal interests do not interfere with orders from Leader Snoke.” That sums up the film’s main plot. The personal goal of Kylo Ren vs. the personal goal of Rey (though she does not know it at the beginning). To find Luke Skywalker. And Luke, a figure of the past, is the key to the future. Either a future of oppression and order, or a future of freedom and democracy. It is a clean, simple story, like the best of our own myths here on Earth. And it echoes what the film is trying to do in reality: looking to the past for lessons, but blazing into the future. JJ Abrams consciously understands that this film wears these two hats, and brilliantly embraces that to create the best film of his career.

The Theme: Letting Go of the Past, But Not Forgetting It

In terms of what the film is about from a thematic perspective, there are a few key themes. But one of its main threads is about letting go of the past, but not forgetting it. All of our major characters except Poe – Rey, Finn, Han, Leia, Luke and even R2D2 - share this struggle.

First, we have Rey, played with an infectious energy by Daisy Ridley. She’s a scavenger on a backwater planet that’s hanging on desperately to her past – the promise of her alleged family. Visually, the film is right along with her, and that’s no mistake. The familiar desert environment is dominated by the wreckage of the blessed Original Trilogy (OT). A world of OT fossils and OT dinosaurs. The Past with a Capital P. Crashed Star Destroyers litter the sandy landscape, and Rey dives into their hulking carcasses, picking them apart until there’s nothing left to pick. Sounds like the last three and a half decades of Star Wars fandom, to be honest. Rey even literally lives within the belly of an AT-AT walker, a vehicle first featured in one of the most beloved of the Original Trilogy’s films – The Empire Strikes Back. Her personal struggle is consistent with this imagery. She needs to stop clinging to her past, move forward, and fulfill her potential. Her first taste of “moving forward,” beyond her initial "rebirth" in the belly of Han's whale of a freighter, is the green of the planet Takodana, which blows her away for a moment (a great little bit of acting from Daisy). But it’s a small step, and to us in the audience, the planet is new but familiar. Just as Maz’s cantina is probably new yet familiar to Rey. But then Rey has a disturbing image of the past, and she begins to be propelled forward. Perhaps Abrams was also giving the audience a jolt too? A distorted, ugly version of the familiar past, as a way of nudging us into a new world?

But let’s move on. Maz Kanata shows up after Rey’s vision and tells her: “the belonging you seek is not behind you. It is ahead.” At first, she rejects this advice. But later, once it’s clear that she must fulfill her potential in order the save the ones she loves, she finally sets her selfish reluctance aside and takes up her father’s sw…I mean, the sword that called out to her. She then accepts that the belonging she seeks is ahead. She climbs a mountain amid a vast sea, where Luke Skywalker, the last Jedi standing like an ancient Druid on the shores of Ireland, awaits her. Her new family – someone from the past (perhaps her past?) - who will help usher in the future (hers and that of the galaxy). But unlike Kylo, as I mention below, Rey does not reject her past entirely. Her scavenger life is a strong part of who she is – her skills and her empathy come from that hardship. And clearly, at least in my view, there’s a force sensitive past that she is tapping into as well. Rey is reaching back in order to move forward. Just like the film.

Secondly we have Kylo Ren, played with nuance and unsettling emotional power by Adam Driver. Kylo hangs onto two pasts. That of his father, Han Solo, and his grandfather, Anakin Skywalker. He hangs onto the light, and his Master (Supreme Leader Snoke) senses it. He hangs onto the conflicted feelings of his grandfather. His past holds him down. Keeps him from fulfilling his potential. Makes him an “adolescent evil” who throws tantrums, and slashes up inanimate objects with his lightsaber as if he is expressing his teenage rage in a video game. On a meta level, he’s a Star Wars fanboy clinging to the icons of the OT. He wants to be an evil, cool badass, like Vader. He talks to Vader’s burnt helmet. He rests his helmet in the ashes of Vader’s incinerated body. Heck, he doesn’t even need his own helmet. As Han Solo says to him on the bridge: “Take off that mask, you don’t need it.” He wears it simply because he wants to be as intimidating as Darth Vader. He wants to look like him. Rey realizes this, and confronts him about it. Hux mocks him like a bully mocking a Vader cosplayer. Kylo’s playing at being a Sith Lord of the past. And he’s afraid that he’ll never live up to those villains (indeed, many fans criticize his character for this very reason). Only when he murders his father as a star is killed and the room goes dark (an excellent visual touch) - when he passes the “inverted” test that Luke Skywalker passed in Return of the Jedi - can he move forward. But as we are likely to see in future installments, he makes a grave mistake. He severs himself from his past completely by killing his father in cold blood. In other words, he refuses the lessons of the past entirely. Ben Solo is dead. And that is his failure. As the Force Awakens novelization states, rather than making him more powerful, killing Han seemed to weaken him. That’s not a throwaway line. The trick is to use the past as a guide for the future, not to reject it completely. But as a villain, he makes the wrong choice.

Thirdly, we have Finn. He is running from his past, sure. But he retains his confused identity, which is a relic of his past. He doesn’t know what he’s “for,” he just knows what’s he’s “against.” He doesn’t want to be a part of the First Order, but he doesn’t know who he is. And so he still dwells in the moral confusion of his life as a stormtrooper. That is, until the Starkiller destroys the Republic, Maz gives him a sword, and tells him to fight for his friends, at the very least. He then surges forward into the future with zeal. He embraces his new role as a hero of the Resistance – fighting to destroy the Starkiller’s shields, and fighting to kill Kylo Ren. But like Rey, he doesn’t ignore his past, and the lessons it offers. He uses his knowledge of the First Order, and its facilities, to assist his new friends, and to chart a purpose for his present and future self. He uses the tools of his past to build the future. Again, exactly what J.J. Abrams is doing within the franchise.

Fourth, we have Han and Leia. In many ways, they are a lot like the old Star Destroyers, X-Wings and AT-AT walkers rotting in the Jakku sun. Both of them are hanging onto their OT pasts. Doing what they were good at: smuggling and generalling. They are also both hanging onto their lost son. This keeps both of them from growing (and even causes them to regress). This also leads them to make what is a selfless, but perhaps foolish decision. To try to reach their son, Ben Solo, and bring him home. But as Kylo Ren tells Han, Ben Solo is dead. Han won’t accept that reality. He clings to the past. Who his son once was. And as a result, he dies a tragic, yet heroic death. Han tries to tap into past feelings – past love – to reach his child. But ultimately, it wasn’t enough. Han is still a hero, and his death is a noble one. But he came into conflict with a major theme of this film: at a certain point, you need to move on. And incidentally, so does Harrison Ford…

Fifth, we have Luke Skywalker himself. He is paralyzed by a past full of failure, guilt and heartbreak. He is rendered impotent, like the mythical Fisher King. Only when the young and hopeful Rey – his Percival – arrives, can he awaken from his slumber, and look forward again. This blend of old and new is brilliantly displayed by the final sequence on Skellig Michael. It is bracing imagery, like a cold sea breeze. And unlike some of the planets we have seen until this point, it is a fresh landscape – like none that we have seen in the Star Wars saga before. This suggests that the past is being left behind. The familiar desert planet, the familiar forest planet, and the familiar snowy planet, all reminiscent of the OT, are now in the rearview mirror of the Falcon.

But not entirely. The island is old, and ancient Jedi huts cling to it like barnacles. An old man in old robes sits atop it. The old hero from the OT, Luke Skywalker. A dinosaur revived. The old will help the new become who they need to be. Luke will help Rey chart her own course. In other words, the OT will impart its wisdom, and help the Sequel Trilogy stand on its own two feet.

Last but certainly not least, we have R2D2! This one’s obvious, but nobody’s talking about it. R2 is in “depressed emo” mode for the whole film. Why? Because he’s sad that Luke Skywalker left. Fifteen years ago! He’s clinging to a rosier past, and refusing to participate in the world of the present. Then Rey arrives, BB-8 does some beeping, and R2 decides it’s time to move forward. He wakes up, delivers the information that’s needed (information he acquired in the past), and in so doing, makes his contribution to the future of the galaxy. As with Luke, he’s a figure from the past that helps set up the future. The old helping the new. R2-D2 and BB-8 come together and chart a new course.

Conclusion: The New Laced With the Wisdom of the Old

J.J. Abrams delivered a perfect baton handoff to Rian Johnson. He took it from Lucas, and ran with it onto a new track. But that baton still had Lucas’ fingerprints on it. The lessons from the OT. Those fingerprints will never fully fade, as many of those story elements are timeless. But over time, as the ST learns to stand on its own two feet, the OT fingerprints will likely become less obvious.

The Force Awakens is a film with a few flaws in execution – a pacing that is a little to frenetic for my tastes, and a few plot points that could have been clearer or more compelling (relationship between the Resistance and the Republic, I’m looking at you). But these are hairline criticisms. Its flaws are absolutely overwhelmed by a masterful coherence across plot, theme, visual language and the film’s place in the Star Wars saga, and in popular culture writ large.

It’s a film about letting go of the past, but not forgetting it. And it’s a film that actually lets go of the past, but doesn’t forget it. It embodies this duality so well across its various elements, that it’s a little hard to believe. Meta, but not overwhelmingly so.

And ultimately, that says a lot about the current zeitgeist. We’re a “remix” culture. We take elements from the past that we like, and spin them into something new. If we’re too lazy about it, we end up simply repeating the past. But if we’re wise about it, we take the best of the past, leave the rest, and create something new, exciting and charged with meaning.

That’s what JJ did with TFA. He took old concepts, and spun them into something new. And in some ways, that’s a more challenging thing to do than creating something out of whole cloth. Frankly, I didn’t think he could pull it off. But he did. And in my view, it may be the best film in the saga.

But don't worry, Empire Strikes Back and A New Hope. I still love hanging out with you guys. But I have a new girlfriend, and need to spend some time with her.

 

Great thread.

Yes, I agree about the freighter providing a nexus in that way. I also enjoyed the contrast between what was going on with Han, as opposed to the young characters, particularly Rey, at that point. The old scoundrel was being drawn back to the life of his younger self - his old ship, his son, the love of his life, whereas the young, slightly star-struck scavenger was on the brink of a new and far bigger life than the one she'd always known on Jakku.

Edit: Brilliant stuff JabbatheHumanBeing. How am I supposed to follow that?!

 

Interestingly, in the TFA concept art book, it is noted that the main artistic direction on the design of Han's freighter was to go for a "baleen whale" look. So, the analysis has an empirical basis.

I might also note that Rey and Finn also traversed the innards of a Star Destroyer right before they jet off into the "special world" of space. Though in that case, its a dead and rotting whale.The freighter's alive and well. And it plays host to an old hero that will help Rey and Finn to the next stage in their own heroic journeys. It serves as both an initial death and resurrection, and an encounter with a sage or guide.

 

JabbatheHumanBeing, wow, yes, timely and timeless. That succinctly puts into words what I've been trying to articulate. I'll go more in-depth in the morning.

 

I love that scene with the AT- AT. Wonderfully acted. The playful way in which Rey tries on the helmet as she scoffs down her meal. Maybe there's some symbolism there in the sense that she's about to start looking at things through new eyes.

 

In either case, it's one of my favourite moments. That whole montage is on par with the binary sunset for me. It shows self-sufficiency and resilience, but also longing and yearning. She's an orphan (literal? metaphorical?) living in the wreckage of the past.

 

Possibly (and interesting - though there may be nothing intentionally symbolic about it - that she wears both stormtrooper and X-wing pilot lenses).

That said, I think the scene is there primarily to convey Rey's desire/longing for adventure, her youth, her limited means of entertaining herself, and her fascination with the old heroes (she even has an old Rebel pilot doll). She later backs this up with an expression of sheer joy as she says: "Luke Skywalker!? I thought he was a myth!"

 

Interesting, though my prediction based on what we saw in TFA is that when it comes to Luke and the jedi, somewhat ironically he will be seeking answers in the past. It seems like he kind of tried to do things his own way with the training of the new jedi, and that ended in tragedy. If he is seeking the first jedi temple, I am assume it is because he wants to learn from its ancient wisdom, find out what he did wrong, and possibly seek to revive the older path as a means of battling the new evil. And if Rey is to be his apprentice, I'm guessing she will follow him down that journey.

 

The wide-eyed, youthful wonder is nicely interspersed with stony faced commitment to more serious matters. The way in which she switches into a much more earnest and adult mode when she sees that BB-8 is being captured for parts, for example.

 

Great thread.

I'll get properly more in depth later, but I'll just start with the themes of Light vs Darkness.

For me, I think a key theme is the idea of an eternal struggle between the light side and the dark, and the forces and players of TFA represent the next evolution in this cyclical conflict.

I love the the opening image of that pristine white moon being knifed, then eclipsed by the black shadow of the dark side's Finaliser.

That theme then continues on more intimate, character levels - especially between Rey and Ren (their costumes reflect the other) before the more galactic stakes. The Starkiller is an echo no doubt, and I can see why some switch off or groan at the rehash there (especially the brief glimpse of Trench Run) but symbolically it's more interesting than the Death Star to me.

It literally sucks the light out of the galaxy and turns it into a powerful weapon of apocalypse.

Of course the film climaxes with our heroes destroying the fierce machine and the darkness is no longer able to contain the light.

Contrast the the explosion of Starkiller base with the DS explosion - there is difference there, symbolically at least - the light bursts up through the planet and a Sun is reborn in a dark corner of the galaxy. Hope is found indeed. Lovely.

BTW, I read a great quote from Kasdan the other day - I'm paraphrasing but it's something about the Heroes being ready to evolve and move forwards where the villains are trapped by the past and who they have been. I love that. A nice continuation from George's thoughts about accepting change and letting go as put across in TPM.

 

JabbatheHumanBeing thread killer mate, you nailed it all. What a great read that was!

 

Sure. Learning from the past in order to chart a new course. Sometimes, there's also a battle between the recent past (in one's lifetime) and the deeper past. The former is often not a place for answers, while the latter is.

In Luke's context, perhaps he went a pacifist route with the New Jedi Order (based on his lesson learned in ROTJ), and this was responsible for its decimation? And now, perhaps he is looking to the origins of the Jedi for some wisdom? Perhaps a canonical basis for a middle path between principle and pragmatism?

 

We also know from another Kasdan quote that failure/ the struggle to learn from the mistakes of the past is a key theme.

 

Even GL said this trilogy was a morality tale. Thats why i believe the lines between light and dark become more blurred in this trilogy. I believe you feel similar Satipo

Edit: for me mistakes of the past refer to mstakes made by the Jedi Council and indeed Luke now as it seems his academy was lost

 

She's not just living in it, she's practically caged by it.

I think you guys are right about her looking through the eyes of the past. Her taking the helmet off is a sign things are about to change.

 

I tried to start a thread like this on release day but very few were interested at the time. I'm glad there's space for in-depth discussion now. My original posts from Dec. 17:

JJ found a new outlet to replace his obsession with lens flare. The Force Awakens utilizes elements of cinematic expressionism in the form of colour, through a combination of mise en scene elements and practical lights and most notably the expressionist coloured lights on the characters. He's played with the lightsaber theme of red and blue, however it looked like the balance was tipped towards red, particularly with the mise en scene. We had the blood on Finn's helment, the TIE Fighter Finn and Poe escaped in, C-3POs arm.

Very often we can see red light that's either off-key, a kicker or fill light for the actors. More often that not it's a little bit of fill light on the actors faces and the in-universe motivation tends to be the practical lights we see in the way of indicator lights or other random glowing things from the mise en scene. Fill lighting for the scenery behind the actors is sometimes blue, and sometimes they get a bit of blue fill on their faces.

The only time I've noticed a coloured light being used as the key (main) light was in the confrontation between Han and Kylo. We start off with a single red key light on Han Solo. The same in-universe light source motivates Kylo's fill light, with his key slightly pushed towards the blue end of the colour spectrum, motivated from the dying sun. When the sunlight goes out there is noting left but the red light on Kylo's face. Han then falls into the blue light below that completely washes out the shot.
-
On my third viewing I wanted to focus more on the performances and music but more expressionistic cinematography made itself clear.
I believe we've got our first slow motion shots from Star Wars since ESB (not counting the lightsaber duels where they moved too fast for the camera to keep up, rather stylistic slow motion."
I think there was a splash of it in the Castle basement just before the 'forceback' montage. There might have also possibly been a dolly zoom. It was something weird. I really want to pay attention on the next viewing.
The most notable use of slow motion came in the lightsaber duel, to great effect. Rey was reminded to use the Force and when she did, everything from her perspective slowed down, giving her the upper hand. It was done tastefully, subtly and I think was a wonderful way to show Rey's internal state. (More start examples for comparison: The Matrix slow motion is motivated by the characters. Snyder slow motion is just for show.)

 

I was really struck the other day by the irony that the superweapon was called "Starkiller" but in the end it actually created a star.

I'm sure there's some symbolism in there somewhere. I'm tired.

 

The whole thing is summarized in the saber lock scene. Kylo is transfixed by Rey calling on the Force, and the stuggle between light and dark in him is recalled by the the locked blue and red blades refelcted in his eyes. Masterful, IMO.

 

I

I love that scene too, maybe the best of the movie. The scene reminds me of some of Mel Gibsons work.

 

Later on in the fight as well, as the pair are locked with their blades at once aligned and in opposition, you get a great yin and yang feeling.

I think this trilogy will ultimately be about balancing the light and the dark - not one obliterating the other.

 

I've read this interpretation a number of times on here, but to me I've always thought the light and dark side are quite literally good and evil, rather than day/night ying/yang type contrast. The light is everything that is supposed to be morally good, the dark is everything morally bad. So when Darth Vader earned his Force Ghost welcoming, it was because he chose the light side and in a sense obliterated the dark side inside him. So yeah, I don't quite see the two coexisting - you can't have say mercy and charity coexisting with cruelty and selfishness.

 

I've come to distinguish between the dark feelings and emotions and the dark side, which is imbalance in favour of those. Things like fear and anger will always be there. They are at times necessary. But when they consume an individual, then that is the dark side. Anyway, off topic...

 

JabbatheHumanBeing, I think the fact that TFA captures the zeitgeist (and it absolutely does—the box office results are testament to that) is what sets it apart from all the other sequels/prequels (including ESB) and makes it the true spiritual successor to ANH.

Its metatextual qualities are a stroke of genius, IMHO. Our pop culture was forever altered by the OT, so how can you make a new, contemporary SW film without implicitly acknowledging that impact? The answer is, you don’t—you embrace the legacy and comment on it in-universe.

But you’re right—thematically, the film is about going backwards in order to move forwards, and this is why any panic people have about Episode VIII being an ESB “rehash” should be immediately calmed. It’s that singular, defining moment where Rey grabs the saber via the Force that marks the turning point in the saga: this is the end of the self-conscious callbacks and reliance on the legacy of the OT. Williams’ score underlines this, signalling that fate has cut us off from the tether to the past, just as when Luke realised his life on Tatooine had come to an end—the same cue swells once more only to shift into new territory. A new era in SW begins… now.

Yes, agreed. But SW will always rest on a similar ancient foundation as well—archetypes, myth and the stories embedded in our culture from long ago.

Satipo, that’s a really interesting thought from Kasdan. It’s almost as if the Dark Side tightly grips in fear—swallows up history rather than accepting the permanence of change. In a way, then, Starkiller devouring suns is an appropriate metaphor, with its destruction symbolising a cathartic releasing of the past. A lot of the imagery centres on darkness subsuming light, including the fact that a superweapon (death) is built into a forest world (life).


Raz Zaphon, fantastic analysis. Exactly what I was hoping for in this thread. If you have a look at the new Snoke images from EW, you can see the Snoke hologram acting as a shaft of blue light, offset by red highlights—very different aesthetically to the scene between Vader and the Emperor in ESB. Abrams has really come into his own, and Mindell was on fire.

 

Indeed. In another thread, this process that TFA goes through of very slowly tearing itself away from the OT has convinced me (in the 95% certainty range) that Episode 8 will essentially create a whole new universe of stories that go well beyond the OT formula (while still maintaining key elements of the hero journey, of course). The "pupae" stage that is TFA was necessary, and satisfyingly so, IMO. It would have been folly to ignore its OT parents, and so it embraced them, and then slowly...let go.

That said, this "metatexual" element of TFA, which consciously swims in OT waters (and has its characters essentially comment on the OT phenomenon - Rey in its wreckage and Kylo in his obessions), did not necessarily HAVE to include story beats that were so strikingly similar to both ANH and ROTJ. That could have been done more subtly, to be sure (and a more subtle approach is what I would have done, personally, for what that's worth as an armchair filmmaker).

But at the same time, there's something very bold about JJ's admission: "You don't pretend the OT doesn't exist, or shunt it off too far in the background, with the first film in that universe. You embrace it with a big bear hug, a little sadness, and then move on."

And to me, the death of Han, the slow build to Luke, and "Emo fanboy Kylo Ren" - something we have never seen before - also tells me that Abrams is a lot less safe than people give him credit for.

But the new GFFA's a-coming, and it's going to be its own thing. The stark, fresh and bracing beauty of Skellig Michael, which looked nothing like anything we saw in either the OT or the PT, was a clear signal of that.